Cloudstreet voted Australia's favourite book in ABC poll
Tim Winton's Cloudstreet has been voted Australia's favourite book in a nationwide readers' poll run by ABC Radio National.
The broadcaster announced over the weekend the results of its countdown to find the top 100 Australian books, with Winton's 1991 novel taking first place, according to The Guardian.
Markus Zusak's 2005 novel The Book Thief finished second, while Trent Dalton's Boy Swallows Universe came third.
Cloudstreet follows the Lambs and the Pickles, two working-class families who share a house called Cloudstreet in postwar Perth over the course of 20 years. The book was Winton's fifth novel and ninth book, and it won the Miles Franklin in 1992.
The rest of the top 100 included adult fiction, nonfiction, young adult fiction, children's picture books, history and cookbooks.
Cookbooks made the list. The Australian Women's Weekly Children's Birthday Cake Book ranked No. 22, Stephanie Alexander's The Cook's Companion ranked No. 56 and Nagi Maehashi's RecipeTin Eats: Dinner ranked No. 96.
Several writers placed multiple books on the list, including Helen Garner, Melissa Lucashenko, Geraldine Brooks, Anna Funder, Peter Carey and Hannah Kent.
The earliest work was Marcus Clarke's For the Term of His Natural Life, published in 1874, at No. 80. The most recent were Sally Hepworth's Mad Mabel and Charlotte McConaghy's Wild Dark Shore, both published in 2025.
In Radio National's countdown of the top 100 books of the 21st century, Dalton's Boy Swallows Universe, published in 2018 by Fourth Estate, took first place, according to Books+Publishing.
